Development on the GLONASS began in 1976, with a goal of global coverage by 1991. Beginning on 12 October 1982, numerous rocket launches added satellites to the system until the constellation was completed in 1995. Following completion, the system rapidly fell into disrepair with the collapse of the Russian economy. Beginning in 2001, Russia committed to restoring the system, and in recent years has diversified, introducing the Indian government as a partner, and accelerated the program with a goal of restoring global coverage by 2009.

Purpose

GLONASS was developed to provide real-time position and velocity determination, initially for use by the Soviet military for navigation and ballistic missile targeting. It was the Soviet Union’s second generation satellite navigation system, improving on theTsikadasystem which required one to two hours of signal processing to calculate a location with high accuracy. By contrast, once a GLONASS receiver is tracking the satellite signals, a position fix is available instantly. It is stated that at peak efficiency the system’s standard positioning and timing service provide horizontal positioning accuracy within 57–70 meters, vertical positioning within 70 meters, velocity vector measuring within 15 cm/s, and time transfer within 1 µs (all within 99.7% probability).